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quarks

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Everything posted by quarks

  1. Kate and Anthony focused video - but it does seem to suggest that this season, Francesca might - might - have more than one line, and might - MIGHT - even have a tiny bit of plot! I shall try not to get my hopes up.
  2. Probably, assuming: 1. Josh manages to keep out of additional legal trouble while in prison. He apparently committed at least one infraction already, and I wouldn't rule out the possibility of another one, potentially leading to new charges. 2. Josh doesn't file any additional/collateral petitions. My understanding - which might be very wrong - is that if the Supremes don't take his case, he might still be able to file a claim alleging prosecutorial misconduct and/or ineffective defense counsel. I don't think there's evidence of either one. But given that Josh already decided not to spare his family and everyone else the costs of a trial, and then decided not to spare his family the costs of an appeal, I wouldn't put it past him to try this technique if he legally can, even without that evidence.
  3. Speaking as a bisexual, queer person, I miss the rainbow emoji already - even if, on this site, the rainbow emoji was mostly used to express thanks, not, YAY THIS SHOW IS SO QUEER! (Uh, not, obviously, Duggar related shows, but something like that one episode of The Last of Us.) When I've seen that anger emoji used on various Slacks, it's usually been used to express rage at the situation. For example, someone complaining about an incorrect medical bill, and others in that Slack responding with the anger emoji. I've never seen it used as a down vote - but the Slacks I'm on are all invite-only. I can see it creating potential problems on a site like this one, where anyone can join - especially given the topic.
  4. I think it can be very hard to completely cut any family member out of your life, no matter what that person did. Not impossible - obviously people do this every day - but hard. There's a 2023 documentary up on HBO Max right now, Great Photo, Lovely Life, exploring this. The family knows what their father/grandfather has done, and yet....they visit him. (Warning: I found that documentary very hard to watch, and, honestly, I'd recommend watching the Mary Tyler Moore documentary instead.) So that's one thing. But also, the Sun just says that he visited Josh, not why he visited Josh. A prayer session? A general family visit? To get a general sense of Josh's physical/emotional well-being? Or was it an attempt to ask Josh to stop with the court appeals after this Supreme Court thing? Or a hard discussion about family finances, with a Duggarling and a Waller coming along to verify/clarify that the Duggars/Wallers/Kellers cannot be expected to support Anna and the kids and Josh's ongoing legal bills? Joe, old enough to remember the financially tight pre-show times, and with four kids of his own, seems like a person who might want to make that argument. Meanwhile, I can't help noting that visits from the Duggar siblings are so rare that the Sun thinks they are newsworthy. And sure, that's partly because, hey, this is the Sun, which has a different definition of "newsworthy" than I do, but it still strongly suggests that most of the Duggars aren't bothering to come and visit Josh at all.
  5. Historically, they've reviewed about 1% of the cases appealed to them. So it's possible that they might decide to review this case. I just don't think it's very likely. Like, about a 1% chance.
  6. If you've ever used Slack, Discord is somewhat similar, although in my experience less user-friendly. You can post in real time, but also scroll back and catch up on conversations. It's also somewhat similar to Reddit, in that the quality/enjoyment of using any given Discord is heavily dependent on that particular Discord, the number of members, and the moderation. I've usually found little Discords (like ten people) to be ok, and larger discords (100 or more) to be virtually impossible for me to use. That said I am not exactly the most tech-savvy person out there. I suspect people who are better with computers than I am (which, let's face it, is almost everyone) have a better time on Discord and/or find it easier to use.
  7. Oh, and yes, this forum is very definitely one of my guilty pleasures. But it hasn't been just a guilty pleasure - it's been very helpful for me to read the different viewpoints here. I've learned a lot. I mean if I could transform myself to look anything like Kate/Simone Ashley I would be absolutely delighted.
  8. See, the problem with these rules for this forum, as opposed to, say, the Bridgerton forum, is that I'm honestly not sure how "self-transformation, global citizenship and kindness" can be regularly applied to a thread that's discussing a convicted criminal. It's possible that this CAN be done, but speaking for just me, I would need some guidance about how to get there.
  9. I don't think that anyone, including Josh, thinks this is necessarily a good idea. It's just his only legal option right now - other than just giving up. And although I don't think his attorneys needed to tell him, well, there's this thing called the Supreme Court, they do have to present him with all two of his current legal options. So this idea could have come from them, or Josh could have said, ok, Supreme Court's next, right? Honestly, I doubt the lawyers are really pushing for this. I think they are just filing the paperwork because Josh asked them to, and he is still their client. But they seem to be just doing their basic due diligence, nothing else. They aren't even trying to appeal on some of the major motions they raised prior to the trial - just on this pretty narrow thing about what questions they were allowed to ask one witness. This. The only real justifications I can see for doing this are: 1. Josh doesn't like being in jail (pull out the microscopic violins, everyone) 2. Josh and possibly other Duggars/Duggarlings (hi, Jim Bob) may feel that not appealing is an admission of guilt - after all, an innocent person would fight all the way to the Supreme Court, right?
  10. Influencers can get paid without giving out a discount code. She was making a point of shopping at various boutiques and eating at different restaurants. There's a non-zero chance she received some sort of kickback from at least some of those posts. The thing is, asking someone in Jinger's earnings situation in September about what her yearly earnings will be by the end of December 2021 is always, always going to be a guess. So I can't read that much into that. And it's also a pretty safe guess that her earnings fluctuated not just month by month, but year by year. Counting On aired 22 episodes in 2017; 18 episodes in 2018; 17 episodes in 2019; 12 episodes in 2020, and of course was cancelled in 2021. The "brand engagement' income may have taken a hit in 2020 for Covid-related reasons, creating more uncertainty. Her lawyers, though, let that six figure number into the deposition record, despite knowing that it was harmful to their case, so I don't think it was completely unfounded.
  11. It's an interesting question, isn't it - how exactly did she reach that six figure income, given in her September 2021 deposition, a statement that, given the timing, presumably reflected her 2020 tax statement/income? I agree with you that it wasn't the podcast - I don't think they made any money from that, presumably why they dropped it so quickly. Same with the cooking shows. But I also think it's very unlikely that the income she mentioned in September 2021 came mostly from the books. To start with, in September 2021, she and Jeremy only had the one book - The Hope We Hold - published by Hachette in May 2021. That book is still in print three years later and apparently selling a few copies per month over at Amazon, but I don't think that it earned out in its first couple of years, mostly because Hachette didn't publish the third book. Harper Collins did. The children's book, You Can Shine So Bright, wasn't published until 2022. It's possible that Jinger was referring to this book as well in her deposition, since she could have received part of the advance for that book in 2022 - but it's equally possible that Hachette held that part of the advance until returns started coming in for The Hope We Hold, which would not have started until September 2021 at the earliest. The third book, Becoming Free Indeed, published January 2023, was presumably sold at some point after November 2021, after Hachette's six month review of sales for The Hope We Hold. So any advance for that would not have been counted for her September 2021 deposition. (And there are solid reasons to think that she sold Becoming Free Indeed at some point after a certain criminal trial) Speaking of those advances: the typical advance for comparative books (memoirs by minor celebrities and/or Christian inspirational books) is somewhere between $60,000 to $120,000. For picture books, usually somewhere between $15,000 to $30,000, regardless of the author. Those books were credited to both Jinger and Jeremy; funds were either paid to them jointly or split. Those advances would have been split into at least three payments, more likely four, spread out over at least two years: one payment on signing (presumably 2019), one payment on delivery (2020), one payment on publication (2021) and possibly an additional payment post early returns (2022), which Hachette (and other Big Five publishers) can and does withhold depending upon sales. Let's assume, for a moment, that Jeremy and Jinger used their roles as "breakout stars" to negotiate a higher advance of $120,000 here, and that - somewhat unusually for Hachette - it was split into three payments and they received all three payments. That's $40,000 for the first book both of them - or $20,000 for Jinger - each year, before the agent cut of 10 to 15%. This fits in pretty well with the income Jeremy reported in his deposition - somewhere around $40,000, which sounds about right for a part time academic job, one or two speaking gigs, and that advance. It also fits in with what Jinger said - that she earned money from the show, "brand partnerships," and the book, apparently in that order, suggesting that as of September 2021, the book had earned less than the show and brand partnerships. I don't know if Jinger received any payments for the show in 2021. But she presumably did in 2020, when Counting On was still filming and on cable/streaming. The other big question is the amount. Presumably - TLC/Discovery/Jim Bob paid both her and Jeremy. Jeremy, though, reported a much lower income. So either they weren't paid the same amount - possible - or, the appearance fees were paid into an LLC, which later paid Jinger one amount and Jeremy another. The other oddity is that Jinger was the only one of the four sisters to report a six figure income. Granted, by September 2021 Jill had been off the show for some time, and at the time, Joy wasn't doing as much on social media, but neither of these applies to Jessa, and I don't think the book was enough to explain the gap between Jessa and Jinger. Those "brand partnerships" though, maybe. Not that any of those partnerships seemed to last long, but Jinger was paid in advance for them, and she had fairly sizeable social media numbers. I expect that did bring in something, which may help explain the discrepancies between her income, Jeremy's income (he was also trying "brand partnerships" at the time, but had far fewer followers on social media), and Jessa's income (lack of access to Los Angeles "brand partnerships.") For 2022 and 2023 though, after that deposition, and after Josh's trial, things may have switched, with the books bringing in more money than the "brand partnerships," which seem to have lessened considerably post-trial. And of course, the show money is gone. So for those years, her income may not have been in the six figures.
  12. They presumably had at least some cash from the sale of their Laredo house, the appearance fees from Counting On, and the advance from their first book. They also apparently spent their first couple of years in L.A. at a house owned by a church member; it's not clear if they were paying any rent. Given all that, they were presumably able to put down a sizeable down payment. Jeremy does have some sort of part-time job at that school - I doubt it pays all that much, but, hey, steady employment. And when Jinger testified in that civil trial, she stated that she was earning somewhere in the low six figures from various influencing gigs.
  13. I think the income situation varies from Duggarling to Duggarling. I suspect, for instance, that money may be tight for John David and Abbie - I'm not sure how many students are eager to study with a flight instructor who didn't check the fuel levels on his plane, and crashed, and I'd be surprised if the Medic Corpse stuff is paying him much of a salary. Thus Abbie maybe/possibly currently working as a nurse again, and definitely shilling that hair stuff for some added money. And although Jessa and Ben seemed to have no problems buying toys for their kids, their main income seems to be what Jessa is making from social media, which based on her court testimony a couple years back, doesn't seem to be that much. They don't seem to be doing a lot of traveling. Jason seems to be more financially stable. Multiple media outlets have reported that he has made some money on real estate deals and building houses on property owned by his brothers, and claims to do at least some work between these trips. So there's at least some income/assets there. Meanwhile, he doesn't have kids; he doesn't have to pay rent or a mortgage; he doesn't have to pay for health insurance; he's had no major medical expenses that we know of; and he doesn't have tuition payments or student loans. It's also at least possible that he's looking at his older siblings with kids and figuring he should travel now, while he's still young, in decent health, and with few responsibilities.
  14. He's made at least some money in real estate, has very few monthly bills, and is traveling in the off season. And if he does have any sort of work ethic, he's hiding it well.
  15. Oh, sure. But to be fair, that reduced engagement is true across the board right now - with pretty much everyone from celebrities to government officials to people chatting about kittens reporting a major drop in engagement on multiple social networks. So that's probably not as big of an issue as it once was. The bigotry and the apparent complete inability to sound sincere about anything, plus the pseudointellectualism, are, I think, bigger problems. Or maybe they just irritate me more. But even with those problems, Jinger apparently earned somewhere in the low six figures in 2017 from various sponsored social media things. The huge reduction in posts makes me think that she's probably earning considerably less than that now, but it does demonstrate that working as Christian influencers isn't completely unrealistic for them.
  16. ...I don't think I personally would or even could describe Jeremy as "hip" even with the use of quote marks.
  17. Is it ok with everyone here if I don't turn on the reminder of this countdown?
  18. Yeah, I think you're completely correct about his lack of chops. But even if he had any, I just can't see many churches, regardless of size, being thrilled about a potential pastor who shows more interest in gourmet hamburgers and expensive shoes than theology. But he and Jinger still have fairly large social media numbers, and have gotten their names on books, so I can see them continuing to pick up the occasional Christian influencer/speaking gig. Maybe even something explaining to us just how Paul's Letters to the Corinthians justify spending money on luxury watches.
  19. I completely agree with you that Jeremy does not appear to have much of a work ethic - or if he does, he's hiding it well. And I doubt he'll ever run out of programs, so, perpetual student is a possibility. I once met someone who had earned three PhDs (and the answer to the question all of you are asking is "family money") so....yeah, possible. But, again, in all fairness, I just checked, and apparently he finished his undergrad degree in 2010, and then worked as a soccer player until 2015/2016, and then as a pastor until 2019 - even after starting his grad program in 2018. He only became a full time student/hamburger person in 2019 after he moved to Los Angeles, and even then, as per court documents, he seems to have picked up some sort of part time administrative job through his masters/doctoral program, which is pretty typical of grad students. Based purely on his social media, to me he always seemed more interested in the bragging rights (look at me, I'm in grad school unlike the rest of those Duggar hicks!) and less into the academics/research. I may be misjudging him there, but I don't think so - most of his posts seem to be about hamburgers and golf and all the great people he's meeting through his program, not what he's learning through his program. And sure, maybe that's because he isn't learning anything, but it's also not giving me the impression that he's interested in learning anything. My guess is that had things gone differently, he would have ended his studies once he earned that MA and could wave it around, saying, see, I'm a serious Christian! And hamburger person! And writer! But then, in November 2019, Josh's car lot was raided, and in April 2021, Josh was arrested, immediately cancelling the TV show and reducing the value of the Duggar brand. Given later reports that federal agents were investigating/interviewing multiple Duggars during 2020 and 2021, it's my guess that Jeremy (and Jinger) had some warning that this might be coming up, and Jeremy figured (or was told) that if/when Josh was arrested, he would now need more than the MA and the Duggar association to continue to get speaking engagements. Thus the doctorate, which may help him get speaking engagements. Not any actual interest in study: for all his irritating pseudointellectualism, he seems focused on the credentials, and not the actual learning. Which suggests to me that he won't be a perpetual student. A perpetual irritant, sure. We'll presumably find out in another couple of years - I don't think his doctoral program is supposed to last all that long.
  20. In fairness to him, he has graduated from two programs already - undergrad and a master's degree - and he's hardly the first or only person to go straight from an MA program to a doctorate. He also does seem to have some sort of job with this program, again pretty typical for doctoral students. And although he might very well follow this up with another doctorate, my sense is that the goal is not so much to be a perpetual student, but to be a perpetual Christian influencer/speaker person. He's already been able to pick up some paid speaking gigs. I think that once he finishes this doctoral program, he'll be able to pick up some sort of teaching position at a small Christian college somewhere, and use the whole "Hi, I'm a professor! With a doctorate! And I've been on TV! Look at my social media numbers! And my photos of hamburgers!" to get a few additional speaking gigs. Between that and Jinger doing occasional shilling for various companies and "writing books," I think these two will be financially fine. Maybe not able to buy all of the lovely watches and shoes Jeremy wants, but otherwise financially fine.
  21. Yeah, this. At most she can point to the Medifake stuff and maybe some house painting/interior design projects, and babysitting various relatives, but there's just not much there - much less any sort of valued, high paying job skill. On top of that, she has the "just famous enough to be recognized from time to time, not famous enough to be able to do much with that," problem, with the added bit of notoriety. It's not as bad for her as it is for, say, Anna, who cannot work in any position that would require any sort of interaction with the general public for at least five more years, but it still adds another layer of difficulty to her job search. If Jana had a specific job skill/training or even an associate's degree, things might be different, but as it is, I think she'd struggle to find a non-Duggar company job, let alone a decently paying non-Duggar company job.
  22. I'm sticking with my theory that after spending a few seconds with Derick, Ben, Jeremy and Austin, Jana opted for the single life.
  23. And although I agree that no one has to watch Queen Charlotte before seeing season 3 of Bridgerton (or any season of Bridgerton), Queen Charlotte does provide some background tidbits for some of the Bridgerton characters. Nothing needed for understanding/following Bridgerton, but fun little things like more about the queen's secretary.
  24. I didn't watch the reel, but someone on Reddit posted this picture, reportedly from James' Instagram: To be completely honest I can't identify anyone in this picture, but people on Reddit seem to think that Josiah is in it?
  25. It might not be helpful, but: a) At least some book fans (including me), are not in favor of sticking with Eloise and Sir Philip. b) Given the combination of first season events on the show, and offscreen events involving Marina's actress, it is very difficult to see a path forward for Sir Philip and Eloise that will not involve negative publicity and potentially alienating viewers. c) And from Netflix' point of view, the number of show viewers vastly outnumbers the number of book readers. And by vastly, I mean that Netflix has reported that Bridgerton season 1 - only season 1 - garnered 113,300,000 complete views. All eight Bridgerton books and the four prequels have, as of mid-2023, sold around 17,000,000 copies Those are amazing book sale numbers, no question, and full congratulations to Julia Quinn, but represent only 15% of the show numbers. And again, that's a contrast between just one season of Bridgerton and fourteen books. Complicating the issue further, as per HarperCollins, about 750,000 of those book sales came between December 25, 2020, and January 15, 2021 - right after the first season was released, and HarperCollins saw another sales spike after the second season was released. Which is to say, at this point, the show is driving book sales - not the other way around. And sure, that doesn't account for library reads, which would certainly increase the book reader numbers - but those Netflix numbers also don't account for how many people are in the room watching the screen, which is presumably at least sometimes more than one person. So I think it's fairly safe to say that, even accounting for library readers, the book fan base probably represents around 10 to 15% of total viewers - and that might be optimistic. Not nothing, certainly, but maybe not enough to make this a huge concern for Netflix executives.
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